CHAPTER TEN
TRISTEN
The nursery samples arrived without warning.
I came home from work on a Wednesday evening to find the living room covered in fabric swatches, paint chips, and catalog pages torn from magazines I'd never seen before.
Oakleigh was sitting cross-legged on the floor in the middle of it all, her growing belly straining against her maternity top as she held up two different shades of blue.
"Oh good, you're home!" She beamed at me like I'd just walked into a surprise party.
"I need your opinion. Do you think the baby would respond better to a soft powder blue or something more like a slate?
I've been reading about color psychology and infant development, and apparently the wrong shade can actually affect their sleep patterns. "
I stood in the doorway, my briefcase still in my hand, trying to process what I was seeing.
"Oakleigh, what is all this?"
"Nursery options. I know Aubree had some ideas, but I was talking to this interior designer who specializes in baby spaces, and she sent over some samples that I think are really superior to what was originally planned.
" She gestured at the chaos surrounding her.
"The woodland theme is cute and all, but it's so overdone, you know?
I was thinking something more sophisticated. Nautical, maybe. Or celestial."
My stomach tightened into a hard knot. Aubree had spent weeks selecting that woodland wallpaper.
She'd shown me the samples with such hope in her eyes, explaining how the soft greens and little animals would grow with our child from infancy to toddlerhood.
It was one of the few parts of this pregnancy she'd been able to control, to make her own.
And now Oakleigh was casually suggesting we scrap all of it.
"Aubree already chose the nursery theme," I said carefully. "We ordered the wallpaper months ago."
"I know, but that was before she really thought it through. And honestly, Tristen, I'm the one who's going to be spending the most time in that room for the next few months. Shouldn't I have some input on the environment I'll be recovering in after delivery?"
The logic was twisted enough to make my head hurt. "You won't be recovering in the nursery. You'll be in the guest suite."
"Well, yes, but I'll be up with the baby for feedings and things.
At least for the first few weeks while I'm still producing colostrum.
" She said it so matter-of-factly, like this was something we'd discussed and agreed to.
"The lactation consultant said skin-to-skin contact in the early days is crucial for bonding. "
Bonding. The word sent a chill down my spine.
"Oakleigh, you're not going to be bonding with the baby. You're the surrogate. Aubree is the mother."
Her face fell, and I watched her lower lip begin to tremble. "I know that. Of course I know that. I'm just trying to help. I thought you'd appreciate me taking some of the burden off Aubree's shoulders, since she's been so stressed lately."
"She's stressed because she feels excluded from decisions about her own child."
"That's not my fault." Oakleigh's voice pitched higher, defensive. "I've been nothing but considerate since I moved in. I clean up after myself, I keep to my space, I try not to bother anyone. But every time I try to contribute something positive, I get treated like I'm overstepping."
I set down my briefcase and ran a hand through my hair, exhaustion settling into my bones. The past few weeks had been a constant exercise in damage control. The magazine article fallout. Aubree's cold silence. The growing sense that my marriage was crumbling while I stood helplessly by.
"You need to let Aubree make the decisions about the nursery," I said. "It's important to her."
"More important than the baby's wellbeing?"
"The two aren't mutually exclusive."
Oakleigh's eyes filled with tears, fat droplets that spilled over her cheeks and tracked down to her chin. She looked young and fragile sitting there on the floor, surrounded by her carefully curated samples, her hand moving instinctively to cradle her belly.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so sorry. I just wanted to feel like I was part of this. Like I mattered."
The guilt hit me like a fist to the gut. This woman was carrying my child. She'd given up her body, her comfort, her normal life to help us become parents. And here I was, making her cry over some paint swatches.
"You do matter," I said, softer now. "But there have to be boundaries."
"I know. I know there do." She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, smearing mascara across her cheek. "I'll put all of this away. I'll tell the designer I changed my mind. I didn't mean to cause problems."
I should have left it there. I should have helped her clean up the samples and then gone to find Aubree and told her what happened. But Oakleigh looked so defeated, so small despite the swell of her pregnant belly, and I felt that familiar urge to fix things rising in my chest.
"Maybe you could show Aubree some of your ideas," I offered. "As suggestions, not replacements. She might appreciate the input if it's presented the right way."
Oakleigh's face brightened immediately, the tears drying as quickly as they'd appeared. "Really? You think she'd be open to that?"
"I think she might be. Just approach it gently."
"I will. I promise." She scrambled to her feet, moving with surprising grace for someone nearly six months pregnant, and crossed the room to pull me into a hug. Her belly pressed against my midsection, round and firm, and I felt the baby kick against my stomach.
I stepped back quickly, my heart racing for reasons I didn't want to examine.
"I should go find Aubree," I said.
"She's not here. She left about an hour ago. Said something about meeting a client."
Of course she wasn't here. She was never here anymore, not really. Even when she was physically present, she'd retreated somewhere I couldn't reach her. We slept in the same bed but might as well have been in different countries.
"When she gets back, then."
"Tristen?" Oakleigh caught my arm before I could leave. Her hand was warm through my shirt sleeve, her grip gentle but insistent. "Thank you. For being so understanding. Not everyone would be."
"It's fine."
"It's not fine. It's exceptional." She looked up at me with those big blue eyes, still slightly red from crying. "Aubree is so lucky to have you. I hope she knows that."
I extracted myself from her grip and retreated to my office, closing the door behind me with more force than necessary.
My hands were shaking.
The interview request came two days later.
I was in a board meeting when Ciara slipped into the conference room and placed a note in front of me. Urgent: Call from Today's Parent magazine. They want to schedule a follow-up interview with Oakleigh about "life with the Wickhams." She already agreed to preliminary questions.
The words blurred in front of my eyes.
I excused myself from the meeting and called Ciara immediately.
"What the hell is going on?"
"The magazine reached out to Ms. Scott directly," Ciara explained, her voice carefully neutral. "Apparently they found her through her social media. She's been posting about the pregnancy journey quite extensively."
"Her social media?"
"Yes, sir. She has an Instagram account with about fifteen thousand followers now. Mostly pregnancy content, but she mentions the Wickham family frequently. There are photos of your home, the nursery space, several shots of you and her together from the magazine article."
My blood ran cold. "Send me the account information."
I spent the next twenty minutes scrolling through Oakleigh's Instagram, my stomach sinking with every post. She'd been documenting everything.
Photos of our kitchen with captions about "making healthy meals for baby.
" Shots of the view from the guest suite window, hashtagged with our neighborhood name.
A video tour of the house that showed the hallway leading to our master bedroom.
And the captions. Jesus Christ, the captions.
So grateful for my Wickham family supporting me through this journey.
Tristen brought me ginger tea this morning when I mentioned feeling nauseous. Some men just know how to take care of you.
Can't wait to see what the future holds for all of us. This baby is going to be so loved.
The comments were even worse. People speculating about the nature of our relationship. Fans shipping her and me together. Questions about whether Aubree was "really in the picture" since she never appeared in any of the posts.
I called Oakleigh's cell phone, my jaw clenched so tight my teeth ached.
She answered on the second ring. "Tristen! I was just thinking about you."
"We need to talk. Now. Are you at the house?"
"Yes, I'm in my room. Is everything okay?"
"No. Everything is not okay. I'll be there in thirty minutes."
I left the office without telling anyone where I was going, my mind racing the entire drive home. How had I let this get so out of control? How had I not noticed what she was doing, right under my nose?
Oakleigh was waiting for me in the living room when I arrived, her face arranged in an expression of innocent concern.
"What's wrong? You sounded upset on the phone."
"The Instagram account. The magazine interview. What the hell are you thinking?"
Her expression flickered, surprise giving way to something harder before settling back into wounded confusion. "I don't understand. I'm just sharing our journey. People find it inspiring."
"You're sharing our private life. Our home. Our family."
"Our family," she repeated, and something in her tone made my skin crawl. "That's what we are, isn't it? A family?"
"No. We're not a family. You're our surrogate. There's a difference."
The tears came again, faster this time, her whole body shaking with the force of her sobs. "How can you say that? After everything I've done for you? After everything I've sacrificed?"
"I appreciate what you're doing. You know I do. But you can't make decisions about our public image without consulting us. You can't tell magazines you'll do interviews about life with the Wickhams. You can't post photos of our home online."
"I was just trying to normalize surrogacy!" Her voice rose to a wail. "I thought that's what you wanted! After the Metropolitan Life article, I thought visibility was a good thing!"
"Not like this. Not without permission."
"Then I'll take it all down." She was crying so hard now she could barely speak, her mascara running in dark rivers down her cheeks. "I'll delete everything. I'll cancel the interview. Just please, please don't be angry with me. You know stress is bad for the baby."
There it was. The trump card she always played.
The baby. The precious, fragile baby growing inside her, dependent on her emotional state for its survival.
I felt the fight drain out of me, replaced by a bone-deep weariness.
"Just... talk to us before you do things like this. That's all I'm asking."
"I will. I promise I will." She crossed the room and reached for my hands, clasping them between her own. "I'm so sorry, Tristen. I never meant to cause problems. I just get so excited about being part of something special, and sometimes I don't think before I act."
"It's okay."
"It's not okay. I can see how upset you are." She squeezed my hands tighter. "But I'll do better. I'll be more careful. Just please don't hate me."
"I don't hate you."
"Thank God." She pulled me into another hug, and I stood there stiffly, my arms at my sides, while she pressed her tear-streaked face against my chest. "You're the only person who understands me, Tristen. The only one who sees what I'm trying to do."
I extricated myself as gently as I could and stepped back.
"Delete the posts about our home. Cancel the interview. And no more public comments about the family without running them by Aubree and me first."
"Absolutely. Whatever you say."
I left her standing in the living room and went to my office, closing the door and leaning against it with my eyes shut.
I should tell Aubree. I knew I should tell her. She had a right to know about the Instagram account, the interview request, all of it.
But I could already picture her face when I did. The hurt. The betrayal. The confirmation that her worst fears about Oakleigh were justified.
And she was already so fragile. So close to breaking.
I'd handle it myself. Quietly, carefully. I'd make sure Oakleigh understood the boundaries without turning it into another explosive confrontation.
It was better this way.
I told myself that as I opened my laptop and started drafting an email to our family attorney.
I almost believed it.